Pipeline dog and pony in Albany Monday

Monday in Albany, Tuesday
in Moultrie,
and
tonight in Valdosta,
the pipeline roadshow is rolling through Georgia towards Florida.
These are not public hearings or town halls:
the pipeline company seems to be trying to get landowners in the path
to show up, but anybody can attend.

Sabal Trail Transmission LLC, which is a joint venture between
energy giants Spectra Energy Corp. and NextEra Energy Inc., hosted
the event to give citizens an opportunity to ask questions and learn
more about the proposed project.

Set up like an open house, the forum had 15 Sabal Trail subject
matter experts on hand to greet residents and walk them through a
variety of information stations covering different subjects related
to the pipeline.

Each station contained general information about building and
maintaining a pipeline, as well as information about the Sabal Trail
project, which came about in response to Florida Power and Light
announcing its intent to use natural gas for its power generation
needs.

The project, with an estimated construction cost of nearly $3
billion, will carry natural gas from western Alabama to southern
Florida through 465 miles of pipeline. Approximately 19 miles of the
pipeline are slated to run through western Dougherty County.

Some of those in attendance, however, felt the open house was not
what they expected, saying it offered little information on impact
specific to Dougherty County and those residents closest to the
proposed route.

Dinorah Hall, who has been a spokesperson for residents who will be
directly impacted if the pipeline crosses on or near their property,
said she found the format confusing and not conducive to residents
looking for specific answers to tough questions.

“I think it was a good P.R. event,” said Hall. “I
felt they were selling the company. There was no real opportunity
for hard-core questions.”

Hall said she — along with many others who are concerned about
the project — was hoping for a more formal event where
citizens could ask questions to which the answers would be given
more publicly.

“How’s this really going to benefit the people of Dougherty
County?” asked Hall. “This thing caught everybody by
surprise.”

These are not the town halls Spectra has been promising.

Monday’s forum was the first of many area events Sabal Transmission
plans to host, as the project moves toward a projected May 2017
completion date.

Although dates have not been set, Grover said the company will host
a meeting in November to discuss the building of a compressor
station in Dougherty County. The station, which would sit on
approximately 60 acres that have not been chosen, would help move
nearly 1 billion cubic feet of natural gas through the pipeline
daily.

Grover also said a second general public information meeting will be
held in Albany given residents another opportunity to gather
information. Grover said representatives from the Federal Energy
Regulatory Commission (FERC) will also be in attendance at the
December event.

Andrea Grover told me last night Moultrie that there would a meeting
with FERC in attendance in Valdosta, as well.
She didn’t know exactly when.